I laughed out loud when I read this quote by Baudelaire yesterday.
You must always be intoxicated.
That sums it all up: it’s the only question. In order not to feel the horrible burden of Time which breaks your back and bends you down to earth, you must be unremittingly intoxicated.
But on what? Wine, poetry, virtue, as you please. But never be sober.
….
If you do not wish to be one of the tortured slaves of Time, never be sober; never ever be sober! Use wine, poetry, or virtue, as you please.
And by coincidence or synchronicity, I also read this article about a new drug, alcosynth, that gives you the joys of alcohol without the hangover the next day and without the damage to your liver.
The inventor claims it should be made cheaply available — there should be no problem with addiction or withdrawal symptoms because of the specific way it affects the brain. How could we doubt it? Thanks just the same, but I think I’ll pass and get my highs other ways.
What intoxicates you? Wine, poetry, virtue, or …?
March 4, 2015
I hadn’t heard of alcosynth. Sounds like a great idea – if it’s as harmless as they make out. Except of course that we may have twice as many drunks because nobody’s worried about the after-effects. So twice as many inane conversations and overbearing loudmouths.
On a general note, Nick – why do you always have such a bleak outlook with regards to your every day garden gnome variety of fellow human beings? It’s depressing. Not enough to drive me to drink. But depressing nevertheless.
Which reminds me (and remember, by your own admission. you are the one with no prejudice): Many “inane conversations” can be had with the “overbearing”, whether they (and you) are loud/quietly mouthed, drunk or sober.
U
nick,
I have more sympathy with drunks than you do. One of my friends envied me because my father was often happy when he was drunk. She didn’t have that in her life and wished her father was more like my dad.
Jean, I don’t wish it to sound saccharine: Life itself intoxicates me.
U
Ursula, My thoughts as well – I couldn’t pin down which of my many pleasures is the overall important one today, tomorrow, last year…. et al.
U,
For you is intoxication just exhilaration, excitement, euphoria or does it include the lows of life?
Cathy,
I agree, it’s nice to have a variety. It keeps things fresh.
To answer your question first. Meditation.
During those old glorious days when I used to imbibe, fellows like me, much admired for our ability to down prodigious quantities of alcohol of one kind or the other, I used to be called as a fellow who never got hangovers because he was permanently drunk.
That works too! How do your highs from meditating compare to your old highs from alcohol?
Music! Where is music on that list, Baudelaire? Great sentiment, however, and one that doesn’t exhort us introverts to be other than we are, either. We, too, can be intoxicated without being drunken or skydiving or skiing down that mountain-scape you posted a few months ago!
Yes, music counts too. I’m sure poetry was just one example of the arts. It would have ruined the flow if he listed everything.
if i were to worry about such things… and i don’t… 🙂
i truly just hang on here by the seat of my pants. i’m not as deep a thinker as the rest of your readers. and you.
though i feel a kinship with you in our love of simplicity and joy.
i choose to think baudelaire meant … be intoxicated with LIFE!
and for me. that is exalting in the ordinary.
but he WAS french after all. so i’m no doubt wrong. and he DID mean a good wine!
LOLOLOL!!!!
I agree that he meant more than just wine. Otherwise he wouldn’t have included poetry and virtue. It’s that last one that cracks me up.
I’m a tea-totaler because it wasn’t good for your health (at the time). Now we buy Two Buck Chuck red wine & I take a sour gulp once a day. (2 Buck Chuck- Charles Shaw, is now $3. )
I did get drunk once (at college). I didn’t like the out-of-control feeling.
What intoxicates me? Life –when it’s going an OK way.
Tom & I really like Masterpiece Theater, Nova, Nature, Modern Family (I can’t be tired, be on my toes for this one). Two hrs. ago we saw Better Call Saul & I’m still LOLing (to myself).
Ursula, all I can say is that I find it hard to have a sensible conversation with someone who’s drunk. In my experience, they tend to be either very self-absorbed and oblivious to anything I’m saying, or deliberately needling me for the hell of it. And I wouldn’t say I have a generally bleak outlook – I greatly enjoy talking to people with a happy and positive outlook, of which there are many.
Different kind of a high, but a high nevertheless.
Real contact with persons or ideas.